2. "I'm not condoning violence, and I'm not condemning it," said Occupy Oaklander Cat Brooks. "I'm just saying that 99 percent of the time when violence happens, it's police who start it. And you have to do what you have to do."

3. "I don't see a way for it to peacefully end," said former Oakland Councilman Wilson Riles Jr., a staunch progressive. "Like so much in Oakland, Occupy has tremendous potential, but it seems like that potential is being squandered. I think it's come to a point where the larger community is going to have to step in if anything is going to happen."

7. "It helps those who oppose us to portray this movement as a bunch of violent, crazy people, and that's just not the truth," Brooks said. "Occupy didn't invent what's happening now - this has always happened in social justice movements. What we really need to do now is engage more of the masses."

10. "If safety were considered a legitimate basis for violating laws and policies, there would, in essence, be no laws or policies governing police conduct," wrote federal Judge Thelton Henderson, responding to the claim by Oakland Police Officer John Hargraves that he covered his badge — in violation of the law — during an Occupy Oakland protest out of fear for his safety.

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